A few years back we told you about Fanhattan, an iPad app, which, a bit like a TV guide, helps you find out which service—say Hulu or Netflix—has the content you want to watch. Genius! Now the company is porting that experience to a set-top-box called Fan TV that helps you sift through madness with innovative hardware and a slick UI.

Before we go any further we should say that as excited as we are about Fan TV, it's still pie in the sky. The company has ZERO official partners for the service, there's no price or street date. We're told all of this information should be available over the next year.

Advertisement

The box's screen interface is a logical extension of what the Fanhattan app did before. Basically, once it's up and running, it'll organize your many streaming video subscriptions, your cloud DVR, and your Live TV into a single interface.

Here's a look at the Live TV interface that would replace whatever your cable operator already delivers:

But beyond the live TV bit the really cool part is how Fan TV integrates all the different ways of getting content into a single UI:

bit like an on-demand-for-everything that does away with the tile-based app interface that's on products like the Apple TV. Instead of being based around apps, the content is based around the actual content you want to watch. You want to watch movies? It'll show you all the possibilities across your otherwise isolated silos of content. And when you've got a specific piece of content you want to watch in mind, it'll show you where you have to find it.

GIF

Beyond Fan TV's awesome interface concept, though, it's a pretty amazing piece of hardware. The experience centers around an Apple Magic Mouse-like remote. There are no buttons at all. You navigate the entire interface with swipes and taps.

GIF

As for the box itself, it runs on the same OMAP 4470 guts as the Kindle Fire HD. It's got an ethernet port and delivers 1080p, 5.1 surround sound content to your TV via HDMI.

Advertisement

Overall, this is a really exciting product that brings out the best of the streaming video universe. We only wish it was more than a "sign up for updates" type platform. [Fan TV]